Dear David, I am finding your message a bit difficult to understand.
I do not believe I ever said "Pastyme" was by Henry VIII. I think the usual way is to say "sometimes attr. Henry VIII." As most of us know the tune appears in many guises, one of which is in the Francesco/Pierino orbit, "De mon triste," as "set" by Jean Richafort (that is, according to Howard Mayer Brown, it is a borrowed monophonic "chanson rustique" melody that Richafort set as a four-voice chanson.). Where did Richafort find it? Similarly many contend that Henry just added words to the French melody. Few know that it also turns up very _surprisingly_ in a lute book by the Paduan priest Melchiore de Barberiis (Venice 1549) under the title "Pas de mi bon compagni," which is obviously a macronic misread of the English words. It's one of those "wandering melodies." But it is very unusual for an English piece to wander "back" to the Continent. Barberiis was a papal conunselor and friend of Cardinal Pietro Bembo, and that makes the question more tantalizing. There's an organ setting by Sweelinck (iirc). I think its an organ prelude based on a Latin spalm. A German Lutheran chorale that uses the tune, and Bach among others made a harmonization. I guess the one for Benjamin, would be from _New_ France (Quebec), where the tune appears in a Jesuit hymnal with lyrics in the native American Iroquois language. Did I not say "wandering melody"? Guess it's as free as the westron wynde. Just don't drink too much and tie one on when you hear it in tavern.<g> Oh dear, I'm not a very good punster. Of course, Charlotte dug out most of this for a term paper for Jeremy Noble. She perhaps doubled the number of known Pastyme pieces. But there's no conflicting attribution with Francesco's No. 34, nor any reason to question the composer attributions. Unless you have some urge to talk about Leonardo da Vinci's wandering beard. =====AJN (Boston, Mass.)===== Free Download of the Week This week's free download from Classical Music Library is Ginastera's Estancia Suite, Op. 8a, performed by the Carlos Chavez Symphony Orchestra; Fernando Lozano, conductor. Click on the CML link here http://mysite.verizon.net/arthurjness/ =================================== ----- Original Message ----- From: "David Tayler" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "lute-cs.dartmouth.edu" <lute@cs.dartmouth.edu> Sent: Saturday, March 29, 2008 3:02 AM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Fingering question | It is a favorite pastime to say pieces are really not by X, | and it is easy because, when you come right down to it, | in the renaissance there is no real way to prove anybody wrote anything. | People argue whether Shakespeare existed. | You can't go exclusively on attribution, because they are often wrong. | You can't go on style, because that is always wrong. | So basically, you have the contemporaries' word in the absence of | contradiction, that is the standard. | If it says X on it, it is X unless there is a really good reason not | to believe it. | But in spite of this, people (myself included, of course) hammer away | at the canon--it is an easy target. | And sometimes, it is right to do so, but many times people try to | take down a famous piece because it is famous. | Many people still think Henry VIII wrote Pastime with Good Company. | Hey, isn't that in the Ness book? I have to have a look (papers shuffling). | | There are maybe some marginal pieces to look closely at, but not "Compagna." | Or maybe I'm too attached to it. | I still can't get over Bist du bei mir. I secretly believe it is | Bach, and probably always will. | Is it fair that once a gorgeous piece is de-canonized, that we play it no more? | | dt | | | At 09:12 PM 3/28/2008, you wrote: | >----- Original Message ----- | >From: "Ron Andrico" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> | > | >(One issue with Francesco' 'La Compagna' is that the piece may | >not really be his after all, coming from a much later source.) | > | >ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo | > | >Victor Coelho's theory was throughly knocked down at the | >Francesco conference in Milan by Chris Wilson. A third source | >has surfaced for the "Compagna" ricercar, likewise attributed to | >Francesco. The Siena MS has works from throughout the 16th | >century, including one of the first works by Francesco to appear | >in print. It was printed in 1529 in a corrupt version, and the | >correct version appears 50 years later in a retrospective | >anthology of Italian lute music, the Siena MS. Nothing in | >between. The Siena lute book is perhaps the | >single most important Italian source of the century. Its contents | >range from music from the Petrucci era through the 1590s, in | >readings that are eminently superior to almost every other | >source. It has lots of pieces from the early quarter century, | >and surely we wouldn't attribute them all to composers from the | >end of the century just because there is no earlier extant copy. | | | | To get on or off this list see list information at | http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html |
